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Day 2: UAS Industry Jigsaw Research

Lesson Overview
Time 50 minutes
Objectives Each team becomes the expert on one drone industry through research; identify careers, certifications, salary ranges, and growth projections; classify drone careers as high-skill, high-wage, and high-demand
TEKS d(2)(A), d(5)(B), d(1)(D)
Deliverable Completed UAS Industry Research Template for the assigned industry (1 per student, but team collaborates)
Materials Chromebooks, BLS pages bookmarked, FAA Drone Zone (faa.gov/uas), DJI Education site (dji.com/education), printed UAS Industry Research Template, projector

Warm-Up (5 min)

WARM-UP: Pick an industry, farming, construction, movies, package delivery, or emergency rescue. How could a drone help in that industry?

Take 5 student responses, one per industry. This sets up the Jigsaw teams, students who pick the same industry will end up on the same team.

Activity 1: Jigsaw Setup (5 min)

Assign each team of 3-4 students one of the 5 drone industries:

  • Team Agriculture: drones for crop monitoring, targeted spraying, livestock tracking
  • Team Construction: drones for site surveys, building inspection, progress documentation
  • Team Film & Media: drones for cinematography, news coverage, sports broadcasts
  • Team Delivery: drones for package logistics (Amazon, UPS, medical supplies)
  • Team Emergency Services: drones for search and rescue, disaster response, firefighting

Each team's job today is to become the expert on their industry. Each team will teach the rest of the class on Day 5.

Distribute the printed UAS Industry Research Template. The template has 6 sections:

  1. What does this industry use drones for? (Specific applications)
  2. What careers exist in this industry? (At least 3, pilot, technician, data analyst, fleet manager, etc.)
  3. What certifications are required? (FAA Part 107? Specialty add-ons? Industry-specific licenses?)
  4. What is the typical salary? (Entry and experienced, use BLS where possible)
  5. How fast is this field growing? (BLS growth projection, news headlines about industry expansion)
  6. High-skill / High-wage / High-demand classification (Yes/No for each, with one piece of evidence)

Activity 2: Team Research (35 min)

Teams research using the bookmarked sources:

  • BLS Occupational Outlook Handbook: search for related occupations (commercial pilots for aerial photography, agricultural workers for ag drones, firefighters for emergency drones)
  • FAA Drone Zone: for certification requirements and current rules
  • DJI Education: for industry-specific drone product pages that show real applications
  • General web search: for news headlines about drone industry growth in their specific field

The team works collaboratively but each student fills out their own template. Roles inside the team:

  • Researcher: finds source material
  • Recorder: captures data on a shared doc
  • Salary Specialist: focuses on BLS pay data
  • Growth Specialist: focuses on industry growth projections

Roles rotate every 10 minutes so every student touches every section.

Facilitation Tip

Construction is the easiest industry to find data on (many trade publications, lots of drone surveying news). Emergency Services is the hardest (career titles overlap with traditional firefighting). If a team is stuck on Emergency Services, suggest they search "drone search and rescue careers" and look at FEMA or local fire department sites.

The team teacher reads through and verifies each team has reached the High-skill / High-wage / High-demand classification before the period ends. This is the d(5)(B) anchor.

DOK 4: Based on your research, what argument would you make for classifying your industry's drone careers as high-skill, high-wage, AND high-demand? Use specific salary numbers, education requirements, and growth projections to support your argument.

Exit Ticket (5 min)

EXIT TICKET (Ranked Justification) · Printable PDF:

Rank the 5 drone industries (Agriculture / Construction / Film & Media / Delivery / Emergency Services) from MOST interesting to me (1) to LEAST (5).

  • Rank 1: _____

  • Rank 2: _____

  • Rank 3: _____

  • Rank 4: _____

  • Rank 5: _____

For my RANK 1 industry, fill in:

  • Drone career in this industry with the HIGHEST salary I found: _____

  • Training it requires (FAA Part 107 + other certs): _____

  • Check: HIGH-SKILL? _ / HIGH-WAGE? / HIGH-DEMAND? __

Bottom line: In one sentence, which of the THREE classifications is the BIGGEST reason my Rank 1 career interests me? (d(2)(A), d(5)(B))

Differentiation

  • Support: Pre-selected research links for each industry (a curated list of 3-4 sources per industry) so students don't get lost in web searches. Pre-fill the FAA Part 107 row of the template since it applies to almost every industry.
  • Extension: Compare two drone industries side by side, which has higher pay, which has faster growth, which is more accessible for someone without a college degree?
  • ELL: Bilingual research template with Spanish row labels. Pre-teach: Industry = Industria, Application = Aplicación, Certification = Certificación, Salary = Salario, Growth = Crecimiento, High-demand = Alta demanda.